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TAIPEI, Taiwan -- Nanya Technology Corp. (南亞), a Taiwan-based dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chip maker, remained the world's fourth largest DRAM supplier in the world in the first quarter, according to market information advisory firm TrendForce Corp.

In a recent research report, TrendForce said Nanya, a DRAM manufacturing arm of conglomerate Formosa Plastics Group (台塑集團), posted sales of US$394 million for the January-March period, up 3.6 percent from a quarter earlier because of higher DRAM prices.

Nanya remained the fourth largest DRAM supplier in the quarter, but its market share fell to 2.80 percent from 3.10 percent seen in the fourth quarter of last year.

Winbond Electronics Corp. (華邦), another Taiwanese DRAM maker, came in fifth in the first quarter, unchanged from a quarter earlier, but the company saw its DRAM sales fall 5.5 percent sequentially to US$157 million.

TrendForce said Winbond's revenue fall resulted from an adjustment in its product line as it assigned part of its DRAM production capacity for other memory chip manufacturing.

Winbond saw its global market share fall to 1.10 percent in the first quarter from 1.30 percent the previous quarter, TrendForce said.

Meanwhile, Taiwan-based Powerchip Technology Corp. (力晶) ranked sixth in the world with US$110 million in sales and an 0.80 percent market share in the first quarter, according to the report.

The report showed that Powerchip's first quarter sales rose 7.60 percent from a quarter earlier, also helped by the surge in DRAM prices.

The three Taiwanese firms were far behind the world's top three in terms of market share, the data showed.

South Korea's Samsung Electronics Corp. took the top position with a 44.80 percent share after posting sales of US$6.32 billion in the quarter, up 6.8 percent from a quarter earlier.

SK Hynix Inc. of South Korea came in second, taking a 28.70 percent global market share as its first quarter sales rose 21.50 percent sequentially to US$4.05 billion.

The sales gains resulted from a significant improvement in the firm's yield rates, TrendForce said.

U.S.-based Micron Technology Inc. remained the world's third largest DRAM supplier, taking a 21 percent share with first quarter sales of US$2.96 billion.

The sales figure was up 22.30 percent from a quarter earlier as Micron began mass production of the advanced 17 nanometer process, TrendForce said.

In the first quarter, global DRAM sales grew 13.4 percent from a quarter earlier to US$14.13 billion as a tight supply shortage boosted commodity DRAM prices by more than 30 percent and mobile DRAM prices by almost 10 percent sequentially.

TrendForce said that momentum is expected to continue and send product prices up another 10 percent in the second quarter.